Using his professional connections, Pascal, the corrupt cop we met in the first two films, has, for the length of their marriage, been scoring morphine for his addicted wife, the schoolteacher Agnes. Things become complicated when his supplier, the crime boss Jaquillat, cuts off the supply until Pascal agrees to do a job for him ' to kill the recently escaped Bruno on first sight.

Refusing the trade, Pascal returns home to Agnes empty handed. When he is unable to give her a reason why, she takes to the streets of Grenoble in search of a fix. This is where, after receiving a beating from a low-life dealer, she finds herself rescued by Bruno. While a relationship between the two of them quickly blossoms, Pascal too finds an escape from his destructive love of his dependant wife in the form of Cecile.  

Focusing on the troubled marriage of Agnes and Pascal, the final feature of the trilogy is the most intimate and resonant of Belvaux's cycle. Creating a web of spiritual devastation, unattainable love, and moral dilemma, After Life highlights the sadness at the core of how the characters interact with each other, giving us an insight into behaviour that had previously seemed irrational. A success as both an unerring melodrama and as the capping off of the trilogy.